Who Do You Think You Are (UK) - Analyzed

Between 2008 and 2010, Anne-Marie Kramer, then at the University of Warwick, was engaged in a research project to investigate the cultural status of genealogy in the United Kingdom. She quickly realized that her project had to take into account the phenomenon that is Who Do You Think You Are? (WDYTYA?). The program, which premiered on the BBC in 2004, has spawned family tree software, a monthly magazine, 'how-to' books, and an annual family history fair. This is in addition to similar programs on other networks and franchised version of WDYTYA? in Australia, Canada, France, Ireland, South Africa and the United States.

Part of her study included a mass observation in which she sent out a questionnaire to 525 volunteer writers on the subject of family history. Of the 224 replies, over half mentioned WDYTYA?.

The responses and Kramer's analysis include the reaction to the use of a "celebrity guide," the affective impact of the show on the participants (e.g. how they had to cope, on camera, with the trauma of their ancestor's lives), the ability of the celebrities to be their authentic self, and the use of a celebrity to tell the stories of everyday people.

Ainsley Harriott's episode illustrates each of these points. (Harriott, a celebrity chef, participated in Season 5. I haven't seen it; Kramer uses it extensively in here article.). As in the US version, Harriott, and the other celebrity guides, are the hook that baits the audience. Very few people would tune in to watch a show about Joe Smith's or Amanda Epperson's ancestors.

Harriott's family history quest took him to Jamaica where he learned that one ancestor was a slave, while another was a slave owner. The affective impact of this was clear to the audience when Harriott visited a church in which there was a memorial to John Davy, who had owned one of Harriott's ancestors.

The range of emotions experienced by Harriott - being his authentic self - is one of the aspects people enjoyed most about the series. Several respondents, however, wondered if these reactions were authentic - they are actors after all.

Finally, while Harriott might be famous, his ancestors were not. Telling the story of his family, enables him and the audience to connect a personal past with the larger historical narrative. Oftentimes, the celebrities' personal past is in conflict with the "official" historical narrative.

One interesting point made by Tristan Hunt (here) is that WDYTYA? is really about "an interest in identity," not about history. He writes, as quoted by Kramer, that people used to study the past to learn from it, but now people turn to history to find out about themselves.

While I agree with Stephen Fry that family history is a great way for people to connect with a larger national or global historical narrative, I find Hunt's point intriguing. What does it say about me and my new interest in my Scandinavian ancestry? What family lines are you actively tracing and which are you ignoring and what might that say about your identity in the present?

*****

Kramer, Anne-Marie. "Mediatizing memory: History, affect and identity in Who Do You think You Are? European Journal of Cultural Studies 14 (August 2011): 428-445.

An abstract is available here. You can access it at this site for $25, but I wouldn't recommend spending that much on the article. It is not yet available to download at the main journal archives (JSTOR or Academic Search), but perhaps a librarian can help you track down a copy of the volume through inter-library loan. It is an interesting article.